Re: How Long Will the 'Card' in Credit Card be Here

I predict that the concept of a physical card will be here for at least the next 40 - 50 years. They are too prolific and people won't change.... You have to wait for my generation to start moving away from spending in society.

My mom still pays her bills by putting a paper check in an envelope with a stamp.... now there's something I personally haven't done in 5 years.

Will the card technology eventually change to a chip? sure!

But for now, swiping is here to stay for the next 10 years in my honest opinion

Re: How Long Will the 'Card' in Credit Card be Here

Might not be full displacement but I can imagine old-style cards becoming almost a niche, and issuers focussing on other technologies. One huge win for the cell phone-based solutions is that it incorporates GPS, allowing merchants to present special offers on various cards when the user is in the vicinity, increasing use for the credit supplier. And then for the user there are apps which can advise you which card to use to get the best reward etc, so users will prefer this, as well as being one less thing to carry.

Yes, it's hard to know if we are in flying-cars-by-2000 land, but many people never predicted the rise of cell phones over the last two decades. In mid 2012, 34% of households had wireless phones only. As time passes, this will become much greater. (Imagine trying to sell the concept of a landline phone now. "When people call, it may not be for you, but someone else in the house. And if no-one is there, well, you can find the message when you get back home.")

Or some other new technology might take over, transmitting devices planted into the eyes at birth for example! (People might want to minimise the number of "cards" they apply for in that case).

Yea Glyph does that now. Your home phone analogy is funny to me because I'm in telecom. We've gone from analog to digital to VoIP and still can't shake analog lines. As antiquated as a traditional fax is they're still around. I suspect CC's will be, too. Plus since I still have to carry an ID a CC isn't a big deal.

GangnamFICO wrote:

Because the chicks dig it when I throw down the card to the waiter and...it comes in handy if I'm short on cash until payday and need a short spot. AMEX gets the booty, and that's important when you're a Pirate.

Re: How Long Will the 'Card' in Credit Card be Here

With all the new technology we have today, Im wondering how much longer the CCC will be issuing cards. My guess is that many of the prime cards may already be experimenting. Have any of you holders of prime cards ever been given the option to have something besides a card issued to you?

I believe you are referring to the "Multi-Interface/Programmable" credit cards. Its an all-in-one type of card that you would be able to program between different account (i.e, credit cards & debit cards). Mastercard is the only company that I know of that has been toying around with that concept. I would guess that type of technology would be expensive to mass produce & come with numerous safety risk, so I do not see that type of technology no time so, at least here in the USA B/C we are so FAR behind!

"having a credit card is nice, but having cash in hand will always be king"

Re: How Long Will the 'Card' in Credit Card be Here

Might not be full displacement but I can imagine old-style cards becoming almost a niche, and issuers focussing on other technologies. One huge win for the cell phone-based solutions is that it incorporates GPS, allowing merchants to present special offers on various cards when the user is in the vicinity, increasing use for the credit supplier. And then for the user there are apps which can advise you which card to use to get the best reward etc, so users will prefer this, as well as being one less thing to carry.

Yes, it's hard to know if we are in flying-cars-by-2000 land, but many people never predicted the rise of cell phones over the last two decades. In mid 2012, 34% of households had wireless phones only. As time passes, this will become much greater. (Imagine trying to sell the concept of a landline phone now. "When people call, it may not be for you, but someone else in the house. And if no-one is there, well, you can find the message when you get back home.")

Or some other new technology might take over, transmitting devices planted into the eyes at birth for example! (People might want to minimise the number of "cards" they apply for in that case).

Yea Glyph does that now. Your home phone analogy is funny to me because I'm in telecom. We've gone from analog to digital to VoIP and still can't shake analog lines. As antiquated as a traditional fax is they're still around. I suspect CC's will be, too. Plus since I still have to carry an ID a CC isn't a big deal.

Yes, I was referring to Glyph as well. I'm in telecom too and we are losing analog lines at an ever increasing rate. Yes, there are still millions, but many less millions than a decade ago! I don't understand why fax still lives (slow and inconvenient compared to scan and email) but I agree it does. As another example of things that have really decreased, payphones. Used to be everywhere, now you really have to hunt.

I agree that any new technology will coexist with the cards that are currently issued. For a while now, I have seen the occasional article showcasing the alternatives to actual cards. Im just wondering when or if one of the big CCC will start using alternatives to cards. Im even more curious to know if we as consumers would prefer the alternative or do we like the prestige of presenting certain cards.

I assume that the replacement(s) would still support different "cards" so, for example, your cell phone could flash and play some special music when you paid with "My God I am Just So IMPORTANT" card. I think "prestige of presenting certain cards" is totally in the mind of the presenter (most staff swiping them quickly don't really care or even notice) but of course that is important for marketing.

Fax lines still exist and it is the only Way to send info to the VA besides snail mail. My hubbs VONAPP counselor needed all of the documents to be faxed since that was "secure"

Anyways... I went to faxzero and faxed the PDF documents. Faxes with a small number of pages are free, faxes with 15 pages cost $1.90

Until recently all expense reports at our Big Telecom company had to be faxed because, well, because that was the policy. So you take your expense report from the web server, print it, then fax it. In the last year or so, they have allowed web submission of the form and scanned uploads of receipts, so progress can occur, just takes ages!

Re: How Long Will the 'Card' in Credit Card be Here

Tech savvy people would embrace some of the changes discussed here. But I think for the vast majority of customers, "da card" will be with us for a long time. Change doesn't come easily in that industry. Heck, we can't even get them to move away from magnetic strips on the cards in favour of chip and PIN.

Re: How Long Will the 'Card' in Credit Card be Here

Tech savvy people would embrace some of the changes discussed here. But I think for the vast majority of customers, "da card" will be with us for a long time. Change doesn't come easily in that industry. Heck, we can't even get them to move away from magnetic strips on the cards in favour of chip and PIN.

I don't think the resistance to chip&pin comes from consumers, who seem happy enough using ATMs. More the costs to business of updating.

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